RAWALPINDI: Munawara Bibi spent most of her life looking after her children. But now she yearns for the day when her son would take her back from the shelter house where she lives along with her husband.

A resident of the Bagh district, the 61-year-old woman has been living in the Nijat old home at Banni Chowk in Rawalpindi for the last eight months.

Before coming here, she lived with her son who works at the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC), Islamabad.

“One night my son told me that his wife did not like the presence of his parents and a sister in the home. He said it would be better if we leave the home early the next morning.”

Munawara said it was not easy to leave her home along with a young daughter who was doing MPhil at a university in Islamabad.

“A friend of my daughter told us about the old home and we took shelter here.”

Munawara said she sent her daughter to a hostel so that she could complete her studies. She said her husband paid his daughter’s university fees through his pension from the army.

“Though I have all the basic facilities, including food, in the old home it is difficult to stay away from my grandson,” the woman said as tears rolled down from her eyes.

Like Munawara, 59-year-old Azra Yaseen reached the old home from Chakwal recently.

She said her husband died in a traffic accident about 18 years back and she had three daughters and a son.

“My son refused to keep me along with his family after which one of my daughters brought me here.”

She added: “My daughter is living in Rawalpindi but she never contacted me. I spent my life taking care of my children but when I got old they abandoned me. Is this the reward for my love with them,” she asked.

Aslam Baig, 65, also reached the old home from Karachi last month.

“I got married with a widow who had already four children from her first husband. I worked as a painter but left the job about four years back due to the old age.”

He added: “I could not believe when my children told me that they cannot provide me food and shelter.”

Another inmate of the old home, Rizwan Saeed said he served in the Special Services Group (SSG) for 12 years till he got retirement as a captain after losing an eye during the 1992 army operation in Karachi.

“My two daughters got married and my wife refused to take care of me due to my disability,” Saeed added.

According to the representatives of the old home, around 10 such centers were functioning in the twin cities, each with the capacity to accommodate 40 to 60 people.

“Mostly, the old homes run on donations from philanthropists. The demand for the old homes is increasing,” said Malik Azhar, who runs the Nijat old home in Rawalpindi.

He said there were two categories of people coming to the old homes: Those who have been thrown out of their homes by their children and those who have no one to look after them because they never married.

Salva Khan, a representative of the Edhi Old Home in Sector H-8, said 43 males and females were living in the centre while the management relocated 67 people to Karachi last week.

Each month around 1,000 people from the twin cities and adjoining areas approach the Edhi centre to accommodate their old parents and relatives,” she claimed.

Clinical psychologist Sidra Akhtar while talking to Dawn added: “In this materialist world, people don't have time to listen, talk and care for the elderly people who need to be looked after like a child. Families consider it easier to declare their old relatives mentally disturbed and admit them to the old homes.”

She said the ratio of depression and anxiety was higher among women because they spent most part of their life in their homes and became stranger to their families when they grew old.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), at present 4.2 per cent of Pakistan’s population is over 65 years of age. The UN-backed Global Age Watch Index 2013 stated that Pakistan was ranked the third worst country for a person to grow old in.

Managing Director Pakistan Baitul Maal (PBM) Barrister Abid Waheed Sheikh told Dawn that the PBM had decided to establish ‘Great Homes’ in five major cities to help the destitute people spend a comfortable life with respect, dignity and protection.

He said the management had set up an old home in Lahore which had the capacity to accommodate 50 people. He said the second centre would be established in Islamabad within a few weeks.

Professor Dr Anis Ahmad, former director general of Dawa Academy at the International Islamic University Islamabad (IIUI), said it was the duty of children to look after their parents when they grew old and needed their help.

He said sending parents to old-age homes was against the teachings of Islam.